


If I Had A Heart

by Ulfrsmal



Series: March Musical Madness Masterpieces [32]
Category: The Last Kingdom (TV)
Genre: Light Angst, Longing, M/M, March Musical Madness (The Last Kingdom), Mentions Of The Trader, Minor Spoilers For Book 3, Mutual Pining, Spoilers For Sihtric’s Backstory, Yearning, watching from afar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-11
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-17 05:43:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29961804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ulfrsmal/pseuds/Ulfrsmal
Summary: Sihtric has always thought their Lord is a handsome man. Finan has been admiring him from afar ever since seeing him for the first time. And yet, both still think Uhtred has no clue…
Relationships: Finan/Sihtric/Uhtred of Bebbanburg, Finan/Uhtred of Bebbanburg, Sihtric/Uhtred of Bebbanburg
Series: March Musical Madness Masterpieces [32]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2185899
Comments: 11
Kudos: 5





	If I Had A Heart

**Author's Note:**

> The title is [a song by Fever Ray](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wF1YVTTVfqo). You may recognise it as the theme song for Vikings (TV show).

Sihtric loves to watch Uhtred so relaxed; the frenzy of battles has already been drained away from him, leaving him well-spent. There is a certain spark of lust at the corner of their Lord’s eyes when the longhouse’s fire illuminates his blue irises just right. The sight captures Sihtric’s whole attention, much like it also captures that of many others. It seems that Uhtred holds the hearts and minds, and probably crotches too, of a lot of women and men present in the room. And yet he continues to not pick anybody to warm his bed at night. Unless one counts the Lady Gisela, of course. But Sihtric's chest aches, like it did when his heart was broken years ago, if he thinks about her sharing Uhtred's bed for too long. So he simply tries to erase the Lady from his mind.

Sihtric's attention snaps to Uhtred when the latter laughs at something Father Beocca said; Sihtric has not caught what. He’s nowhere near close enough to distinguish any of the barbed words coming from the priest. Sihtric is also quite sure that he would like none of them if he did catch them, because the priest doesn't seem too fond of him. Some days, he barely tolerates Finan and Uhtred; either due to a shared religion or a common past. Sihtric, of course, remains excluded from both options. As always. He can deal with that. It isn't anything new.

The fire dances in time with Uhtred's remark to the priest; Sihtric can see those plump lips moving, but he hears not a single word. All he can concentrate on is the way in which Uhtred's mouth is split opened, alight with that playful smile he so often dedicates to Finan. Sometimes he even directs it towards Sihtric himself, and it leaves the rogue wanting more of it every single time. Sihtric wonders whether he'll see that beautiful curve in his dreams tonight. It wouldn't be the first time...

His little reverie is gently shifted back into reality at the sound of Uhtred's laughter. Sihtric's heart swells. Or at least he thinks he's felt that in his chest, maybe his stomach, but not in his crotch. He wishes he could move close enough to catch every word Uhtred is saying. Alas, it’s not like he, nor the priest, would ever include Sihtric in their private conversations.

He is Kjartan’s bastard son, the vestige left behind by a slave-woman who tried to poison the man whose child she was forced to carry, only to find her end at his hounds’ jaws. He is nothing. Sihtric is pretty sure he doesn’t even have a heart beating in his chest anymore. If he ever had one, that is. He remembers feeling the horror and the fear of being a child in Dunholm, but little else. There never was something, nor someone, he held dearer than his own mother, and she was forcefully taken from his side when he was almost too young to fully understand why.

Until he met the lordly man who ordered him to kiss his sword's hilt while holding Sihtric's hands in his own; the man who later stared at and touched Sihtric's neck while calling him _pretty_ with a filthy smirk on his good-looking face.

A new, yet equally beautiful, smile from Uhtred thaws the imaginary ice coalescing around Sihtric’s body. Sadly, his ribcage remains split opened, like Uhtred's lips when they form that smile, hollowed out and utterly empty. Sihtric feels raw when Uhtred's scorching gaze sweeps over the whole longhouse; he quickly looks down, lest he be caught blatantly staring at someone he knows would never call Sihtric his lover. Uhtred has always been kind to him in both word and deed, yes, but Sihtric does not want to test his luck anew by letting himself be caught like this. He already tested it enough back at Kjartan’s fortress, and also while he tried his best to help his current Lord, even though they both knew Sihtric had almost no more intel left to give.

In the periphery of his vision, Lord Uhtred rises from his seat and moves through the longhouse’s wide floor. The fires at its centre envelop him in a bewitching play of lights and shadows, dancing across his unarmoured form with a delicacy that Sihtric knows his own fingers could never match. It is best like this, he tells himself as Uhtred passes him by and winks at hi–

 _Gods_ , Sihtric gasps, all air knocked out of his lungs, his stomach quivering even more violently when Uhtred smiles at his reaction. Sihtric wonders if the flickering flames are enough to hide his blush. He hopes they are. He does not want to become a problem for their Lord. He would undoubtedly cause trouble if his affections were made public. Either by the men's gossping, Uhtred's reputation changing, or simply the Lady Gisela bemoaning Sihtric and cursing Uhtred aloud. No, it is best if Sihtric keeps his distance, if he keeps his thoughts to himself, if he never lets their Lord know that he l–

Uhtred reaches out to take both ends of a heavy wolf-fur and pull it over Sihtric’s slender shoulders. It has been treated quite thoroughly and rendered soft, but Sihtric doesn't feel it at all; not with Uhtred's body so close to his own. Uhtred's knuckles ghost across the underside of his jaw as he pulls the fur’s lapels closer towards the hollow of Sihtric’s neck; he instinctually raises his head. Another shaky breath escapes him, and Gods, please don’t let it hit his Lord’s face…!

Lord Uhtred’s hand grabs at the fur’s now-closed collar and uses it to sway Sihtric forward, though only by a hair’s breadth. Sihtric feels himself blush more from the almost inexistent distance between his mouth and Uhtred's, and from the way he knows he’s trembling under Uhtred’s close scrutiny. His beautiful eyes are dark, because they are barely illuminated by the flames. Sihtric can see only the thinnest ring of hypnotising blue at the rim of his irises.

The narrow space inside Sihtric’s chest where he imagines his heart would be is aflame. If he had one, it'd be beating quite fast by now, in time with the blood thrumming at his temples. Uhtred’s mouth falls half-opened, almost like it's mirroring Sihtric’s own stunned expression. Shamefully, he cannot stop his gaze from being pulled to Uhtred's highly kissable lips. There's a borderline invitation held delicately in the slightest peek of Uhtred's tongue in between them when he licks at his bottom lip. But surely that's simply a thing that happens naturally when Uhtred concentrates on something. It has happened before. The invitation has never been for Sihtric. He wishes he was the one being invited.

 _More_ , he desperately thinks, praying to all the Gods and all the Goddesses high in Ásgarðr’s mighty halls, _please let me have more of my Lord_.

* * *

The fire has dwindled into a mere semblance of past embers by the time Finan’s watch starts. He would resent having to take guard-duty tonight, but he hasn’t drunk nearly enough during the celebratory feast earlier to drown his own thoughts. His mind refuses to stop, although he can feel the start of a headache settling in, right in between his worries and his memories. Or, in other words, Finan doesn’t mind having to be awake at ass-o’clock at night because he hadn’t been sleeping in the first place.

But how could he have slept, when Uhtred had decided to look just like he always does after a won battle, all flame and beauty and that fierceness that had pulled Finan in from the first time he laid eyes upon him…?

His torso turns on its own volition, gaze falling on Uhtred’s sleeping form. The worry dissipates, just like it had the past twenty-four times he's looked at him thus far. He looks peaceful, blissfully asleep. Good. He deserves all the sleep he can get. He deserves to be taken care of and looked after. And not just because of his birthright, nor his title, either. Hell, Finan himself was a Prince once too; he knows how these war-dances go.

His worries return in full force when he recalls how Uhtred had stumbled down from the bedroom he should share with Gisela not even a full hour ago. He'd greeted Finan with his usual, scorching stare and playful smile, lingering about under the thin pretence of getting a cup of water. Finan had almost grown tired enough of the charade to demand Uhtred explained himself; but then the irreverent Heathen had sat down at Finan's side and glided his way into a smooth conversation. Finan had rolled his eyes and looked away to keep his watch-duties intact, but obliged. He can never say no to Uhtred.

The next time Finan looked at him had been when Uhtred remained silent even after Finan whispered his name like a prayer. He'd been rendered breathless at the sight of Uhtred lying on his side in between the furs Finan had been sleeping on, fast asleep and facing Finan. If he wanted to indulge the games of the heart, although he doubts he even has one of those anymore, Finan would think that Uhtred had been observing him before falling asleep. The thought is more intoxicating than the sweetest of meads.

Finan doesn’t have the heart to move him, either, although he knows he should. Lady Gisela is not a woman he wants to see angered. He should see to it that Uhtred returns to her bed unscathed, and long before morning comes. And yet he doesn't move. It will be synonym with invoking her anger come morning. Finan cannot bring himself to feel anything about that, though. If she drowns in wrath, so be it. It wouldn't be much different from the angry looks of all the people who have been repeatedly rejected by Lord Uhtred, by Finan himself, even by the handsome young man with the mismatched eyes. Cat’s eyes, that one. Finan is reminded of a small black kitten with huge, bicoloured eyes every time he sees Sihtric. He completely understands why Lord Uhtred has decided to keep him around. Finan would have done the same.

Uhtred burrows further under the furs, curling the edge so that the soft pelt caresses his nose and his cheek. Were his mouth opened, he’d probably been startled awake right about now, since the hair would rest against his tongue, and that cannot possibly feel pleasent. Finan stares at Uhtred's peaceful face, protected by the knowledge that Uhtred cannot see him now. The entire hollow cavity that is Finan's chest aches with a forlorn pain he has never felt before when he realises that Uhtred is practically _kissing_ the brown-bear fur Finan had been lying most on top of, back when he'd been pretending that he could sleep after the feast. Finan hopes he has not tainted it, hopes it doesn’t reek of Ireland, of the honeyed mead in his breath.

Strange, Finan thinks with the slightest, bitterest of sad smiles. The fact that he worries so much about their Lord’s comfort isn’t a foreign concept to him; after all, he has been looking out for Uhtred ever since they first met. No, the real issue lurking right underneath his sun-kissed skin is the ache that always takes over his chest whenever he sees Lord Uhtred. Finan has not yet placed it, though; it doesn’t directly correspond with any of the emotions that he’s regained since he was made a free man again.

It’s not the violent rage that rushes forth from within whenever he is let loose and free by Lord Uhtred’s shouted command from the shield-wall.

It’s not the nothingness of despair, the empty Hell reserved for those who have no more things to give and no one left to despair for their absence from home.

It’s not the elation, the instant attraction, that he felt when he first laid his gaze upon Sihtric’s slender frame and parted lips and mismatched eyes.

Uhtred shifts in his sleep, the fur he’d covered himself with flying half off his well-muscled body. Soon after he starts to shiver, because they might be close enough to the town’s ramparts to have easy shelter if it starts to rain, but the night is still cold, and Uhtred is down to a thin undershirt. Finan sighs one of those bone-weary sighs he’s been emitting more and more often lately. It would seem that his own empty chest and the sight of Lord Uhtred always bring them forth.

He slowly moves the covers back over the shivering Lord, instantly noticing that the only one he’s kept close to his face is the brown-bear fur Finan had laid on. Another of those foreign pangs strikes at him from the inside out. Finan gasps, hands trembling atop Lord Uhtred’s shoulder, hoping his actions will not cause him to wake. God knows he needs all the rest he can get, after the long days he’s had and the longer days looming ahead.

Uhtred is warm and solid under his palms. He doesn't startle, doesn't spring instantly awake like he normally does. If Finan were one to indulge in such heartfelt thoughts, he'd think it due to the sheer trust Uhtred places in him. But he does not. At this point, after everything he's been through, in Ireland and in England and at sea, he swears he has no heart left to break.

 _More_ , he desperately thinks, praying to God and the Virgin Mary and all the Saints he can remember the names of high in Heaven’s pure skies, _please let me have more of my Lord_.

**Author's Note:**

> Ásgarðr is one of the Nine Realms; the one where the Gods live. English spells it as Asgard.
> 
> It's... interesting, to say the least, to navigate Uhtred's attraction to Sihtric and Finan, plus his obvious love for Gisela. I'll have to think harder about that for next time!


End file.
